


capsized, erring on the edge of safe

by consultingwives (westminsterabi)



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-15
Updated: 2016-03-19
Packaged: 2018-05-26 22:44:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6258742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westminsterabi/pseuds/consultingwives
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Max, I can’t just sit here and listen to you rag on yourself like this, it’s f*cking horrible, it’s too painful for me to bear, so if you expect me to just stay quiet while you beat yourself up over and over and over until you’re practically on the verge of a breakdown, you’ve got another f*cking think coming.” </p><p>“Ugh, Chloe! Don’t you get it! You’re not helping, you’re not—I don’t—I can’t…” </p><p>“Hey.” I reached my hand over and placed it over hers, gave it a squeeze. “I’m here. I’ll shut up. I love you.” </p><p>“Okay.” She paused. “Love you too.” </p><p>-</p><p>Max blames herself. Chloe wishes she would stop. She also wishes a couple other things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> title from the Tegan and Sara song The Con

The first thing I noticed was the smell. Destruction has a smell, it’s like rot, and smoke, and dust, and a dirty cocktail of everything unpleasant mixed together in this weird vortex of death that’s claimed everyone you love. (But you’re alive, you’re alive and _everyone_ you’ve _ever fucking known is fucking dead._ )

 

That day the two of us hopped in my truck and drove north, _just_ the two of us, off on some kind of guilt-ridden trash road-trip adventure while I felt bad about being the one Max kept alive and she stared out the window looking pretty guilty herself.

 

“You know, Caulfield, it’s not your fault,” I told her, for about the twenty-thousandth time. I felt like she wished she hadn’t decided what she did, and that made me feel like shit—that she thought I wasn’t worth it—I _wasn’t_ worth it. I should have been fucking grateful, but I wasn’t. I was a lazy stoner, a good-for-nothing delinquent dropout, and all those people—

 

“You can’t just keep repeating ‘it’s not your fault’ and expect it to be more believable, Chloe,” she said, almost crying. “It’s not even fucking like you, that’s not the kind of thing you’d say unless you really _did_ believe it was my fault, so please stop.” She dangled her fingers out the window, which was smeared with all kinds of grime and raindrops from the storm (and also not washing it for probably, like, six months). “Sorry,” she said, like it was an afterthought.

 

“Don’t you fucking dare rewind,” I said, because that was the first thing that came to my mind; she might not be that reckless, but I didn’t want her to go around screwing with things all over again just because she said something stupid—something so quintessentially Max. (“Of course I came back for Blackwell”.) Who would be the selfish one, in that case? I was tapping my chipped fingernails on the steering wheel, trying to think of something to say that would make her feel better, but there was fucking nothing.  

 

“You had a shit choice,” I said.

 

She curled her hand into a fist like she was about to punch the air. Instead she huffed and leaned back in the passenger seat, closed her eyes. Her voice was quiet. “Please stop.” I heard a sob, but it was pulled back, like she was trying to keep it in.

 

“I heard that.” It came out more judgmentally than I wanted it to. “Sorry, I mean—like, I hear you sobbing, Super Max.” I took my right hand off the wheel and put it on hers.

 

She stayed quiet. I figured that it was best to keep it that way. For over a hundred miles, I didn’t say anything, no one said anything, maybe Max was asleep. I was just driving mindlessly, and when I ran out of gas and stopped for more, because it wasn’t like I’d planned ahead or anything, who knew we’d be bailing on Arcadia Bay just like _that_ , Max just laid there, eyes closed, not talking, which was a little creepy. I pulled open the passenger-side door, so we could both get a little fresh air.

 

“Hey Maxi, you better not have been messing around with time, because I _know_ you zone out when you do that—“

 

Her eyes flew open.  “Chloe, what the _fuck_.”

 

I laughed. “Just a joke, Max.”

 

“ _Just a joke?”_ I could see her face crumple up, just like it always has before she freaks out. “Are you _serious_? Like, hundreds of people are dead and you think it’s funny, you think that I’d still use this fucking power, do you really think I’m that twisted—“ she was choked off by a sob, a big one, one she probably couldn’t have kept down if she’d tried.

 

“I’m sorry,” I said, keeping my distance, but wishing that I could hug her.

 

“I can’t fight with you,” she said, heaving deep sobs. “You’re all I’ve got left—you’re what I—that’s why I—it would all be for nothing—“ She wiped her face, blinked away the tears, looked at me, and sobbed again.

 

“Is this what you’ve been holding in these whole hundred miles?” I asked her, quietly. “Max, you have to talk to me, otherwise I don’t know these things. You have to tell me, Jesus Christ, you can’t just keep this all in, let it _fester._ ”

 

She went quiet again. “I’m going to pay,” I said. Flatly. I walked over to the pay station.

 

“Thirty on pump twelve,” I told the cashier, handing him a ten and a twenty, all the cash I had.

 

“You got it,” he said. He smacked his gum and punched in the total. “Have a nice day.”

 

“Uh, yeah. You too.” I said. I rolled my eyes as I opened the glass door and walked back to Max. _Nice day._ Like this day could actually get any shitter. Shittiest day of my life, except the day my dad died. Maybe I shouldn’t think about that. I was probably an orphan now, come to think of it, my mom had probably burned to death in the Two Whales, like she had in that alternate reality where _I_ was already dead, and if she hadn’t, god knew where she was, we’d just blasted back through town, without bothering to check for—

 

Bodies.

 

Shit. I couldn’t go there. Couldn’t think about that. The survivors would be airlifted to Portland, so all that was left back in town was heartbreak, bodies. Dead people. My body, in another world. People who’d died. People who’d died for me, although they didn’t know it.

 

I wasn’t worth that. Could I ask Max to go back or some shit?

 

No. I couldn’t make her feel even guiltier.

 

She was still waiting there, in the truck, her legs swung over to the side and her eyes bloodshot from crying.

 

“It’ll be okay, Max,” I said, while I pulled out the pump and punched in the type of fuel (Regular, duh, who splurges on that premium crap?), trying to act normal, like everything was okay. One day, it would be, both of us would stop feeling like shit for making the decision (it was Max’s decision) that levelled a fucking town. We’d get on with our lives. I’d stop thinking about Rachel and fucking Frank. Maybe. We’d still be there for each other, if our friendship fucking _survived_ this. I mean, it had to. Otherwise, according to Max, this would all be worth nothing, even though I was still a living, breathing human being, who wouldn’t even be here otherwise, who’d have died in a bathroom of all places, shot to death by Nathan Prescott (because “no one would even miss your punk ass.” No, no one will miss yours, Nathan, you whiny, rich, pampered piece of shit.)

 

Jesus.

 

How do you repay someone for giving you another shot at living, for literally ripping time apart to save your life? I mean, you don’t, but…

 

Well, you sure as hell don’t tell them about your unrequited crush. That was the kind of pressure that Max _didn’t_ need right now, not after making universe-altering, soul crushing, hella difficult decisions. Especially after what happened to the _last_ girl I’d been in love with, buried in a _landfill_ with the trash, when she’d deserved so much better than that.

 

The pump clicked. I’d used up my credit.

 

“Hey Maxi Pad, you hungry?” I asked. I twisted the gas cap and shut the door, rusty piece of crap-ola. It didn’t close all the way.

 

“Not really,” she said, wiping her eyes.

 

“Me neither,” I said, climbing back into the driver’s side. I was singing a bit off-key. “ _On the road again / Can’t wait to get back on the road again_ …”

 

“Jesus, Chloe, can you stop?”

 

“Okay,” I said, twisting the keys in the ignition, a little miffed _. Joking is how I cope, okay, it’s how I’ve dealt with everything from my dad fucking_ dying _to you leaving to like, life-altering, universe-screwing, bullshit decisions that you have to make because the universe won’t make them for you._ I just couldn’t think of any other way to manage all this crap. But I’d try, for her. She hadn’t been all jokey when I was seriously fucking upset about my dad, screaming at her. She hadn’t cracked a stupid joke then, so I really needed to stop.

 

“Where to?”

 

“I dunno.” Her voice sounded lifeless. “Seattle, I guess. Just meet up with my parents. That’s like, plan A.”

 

“Sure thing, Max, mind punching those directions into your smartphone for me?”

 

She made a face. “Can’t you just act real, Chloe? Like, not fake cheery or—whatever it is you’re trying to act like in order to get me to feel better, it’s not helping. Just stop. You were plenty serious back up on the cliff, you were actually real, now I feel like you’re not being anything.”

 

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

 

She closed her eyes again and sniffled. No sobbing. “I don’t want to fight.”

 

“ _Right,_ because then this would _all_ be worth nothing, I wouldn’t be worth anything if you can’t have me, if we’re not perfect bee-eff-eff-els, _my life_ wasn’t worth it, do you know how fucking selfish that sounds?!” I couldn’t help it; I was pissed, the way she was talking, the way she was so casual about it. When I offered to die for everyone in the town, that was for all of them, it wasn’t some lighthearted thing, I knew _they’d_ die if I didn’t.

 

And, besides, it wasn’t a decision that _I_ decided not to take, this wasn’t my fault, I hadn’t asked for any of this (except that one time, when I’d shot myself in the gut by accident—I didn’t remember that, obviously, but Max did and in hindsight it sounded kind of funny although it probably hadn’t seemed that way), and just because I didn’t _remember_ any of those deaths I’d been through didn’t mean that I didn’t feel them in my bones, didn’t mean that I couldn’t remember them some kind of weird, primal way.

 

“I didn’t mean it that way,” she said.

 

“Like _hell_ you didn’t! And don’t you _dare_ fucking rewind, don’t you fucking dare take it back—“

 

Maybe she already had. Maybe this was the second, or the third, or the seventh time we’d had this conversation, and she’d tried to go back already, and I’d fucked it up (no, _she’d_ fucked it up) every time. It was messing with my head, wondering, wondering, always curious, never quite knowing if every little moment had been orchestrated.

 

“Chloe, please…”

 

“Okay,” I said, sniffling. “I’m done. Okay. I’m done.” I pulled over onto the shoulder and let the tears stream down my face. “I’m sorry. I’m done. I’m not mad at you. I love you.” I undid my seatbelt and leaned over and gave her a hug, with the engine still running. The feeling of her against me made everything so much better in that moment.

 

“I love you too,” she said, from over my shoulder.

 

“Okay.” I wiped my face with both hands. “Christ, Caulfield, you’ve really got me going here.”

 

“What can I say?” she said, with a chuckle. It sounded lifeless, not quite sincere, but we’d ( _she’d_ ) just single-handedly destroyed a town of like, ten thousand people. She was allowed to fake a couple laughs. “Okay, let’s get on the road. We’ve still got like, four hours.”

“Right’o, cap’n Max.”

 

That got me a real laugh.

 

“Seattle-ho.”

 

-

 

“What made you decide?” I asked, a hundred miles out of Seattle, tired as fuck and ready to maybe catch a break. Then I thought better. “Shit, that was insensitive, could you rewind and tell me not to say that?”

 

It was dark by that point, and we’d left the coast and wouldn’t hit it again until Puget Sound. We’d taken the long way, via Astoria, along the Pacific. Everything seemed calm, for everyone else around it was just an early autumn night, chirping cicadas, trucks along the highway. I was an idiot.

 

“No, it’s okay. Really. It’s your life. You deserve to know. I mean, I guess it was like—chaos theory, like you were talking about. For me, you living was the one thing that I could control. Everything else, the hurricane, the beached whales, all that freaky crap, I had no control over that, no matter what I did it might still happen, or I might wind up triggering something worse, but saving you was the one sure thing, the one thing I knew would _work._ ” She looked at her lap and took a breath. “That might not be what you want to hear, but that’s the truth.”

 

“Well,” I said, looking at that stupid bobblehead on my dash, (ugh) “I’m actually kind of relieved.”

 

“What? Why?”

 

“Well, I’m glad it was a calculated decision, not just some, ‘I care about Chloe so fuck the world and fuck Arcadia Bay’, so I still feel pretty shitty but maybe not _as_ shitty because there were like, other factors involved.” I tapped my fingernails on the wheel again.

 

“That’s one way to look at it,” said Max. “I think you can turn your brights on.”

 

I clicked the hi-beams. “Way to change the subject, Maximillian.”

 

“I guess I’m too tired to talk too much about this. Please don’t push me.”

 

“Fair enough. Okay. But what are you going to tell Ryan and Vanessa?”

 

“Nothing, duh. They’d think I was nuts. I mean, they know what happened to the town, but they don’t know that it was my—“

 

“Stop. It wasn’t your _fault,_ don’t you dare say that word Max, don’t say the word _fault,_ this whole thing is no one’s fault except whatever crazy god or force or whatever gave you this power that managed to destroy a town, but you couldn’t know, none of this is on you. Also I know you told me to stop saying that, but really. Please believe me.”

 

“Every time you say that it feels less true.”

 

“So what should I say?”

 

“Don’t say anything!”

 

“Max, I can’t just sit here and listen to you _rag_ on yourself like this, it’s fucking horrible, it’s too painful for me to bear, so if you expect me to just stay quiet while you beat yourself up _over and over and over_ until you’re practically on the verge of a breakdown, you’ve got another fucking think coming.”

 

“Ugh, Chloe! Don’t you get it! You’re not helping, you’re not—I don’t—I can’t…”

 

“Hey.” I reached my hand over and placed it over hers, gave it a squeeze. “I’m here. I’ll shut up. I love you.”

 

“Okay.” She paused. “Love you too.”

 

“We’ll be at your parents’ in like, an hour. If you gotta do a primal scream, get it out of your system now.”

 

“I’m good.”

 

It was like word puke or something, _it’s not your fault,_ I just couldn’t stop it coming out my mouth, like some kind of…compulsion or whatever. What was I supposed to say, or do, to stop Max from just going into a super dark place that she might never come out from? She kept blaming herself, she felt bad, and maybe it wasn’t about me or anything, but even so I felt bad and gross and dirty for being the reason that she was going through this, that maybe if I hadn’t been fucking with Nathan _none_ of this shit would have happened. It was mine. It wasn’t anyone’s. It was mine. It was somewhere in-between. It was Nathan’s, for toting guns to school; Jefferson’s, for being a fucking creep; Principal Whats-His-Face for just being a douchebag alcoholic. The list went on.

 

But Max was like, the one person who wasn’t to blame, she’d just blundered into this whole mess that Arcadia Bay had been in before she showed back up, with this crazy new power to fix people’s mistakes, especially her own, and she’d used it because she was a _good person_ and _liked_ helping people and liked making things better and saving lives and doing all kinds of Good Samaritan crap. Like trying to help people was her fault or something.

 

Like trying to help _me_ was a bad thing.

 

Like this had all happened because she’d helped _me._

 

And what was worse, she could never tell Ryan and Vanessa, no amount of therapy would ever be able to fix this because no therapist would ever believe her. She’d feel so guilty and awful for something she hadn’t done and she couldn’t go get help for it because they’d think she was making it up.

 

I gave her hand another squeeze, just to remind her that I was there for her, and hoping that she wouldn’t think I was making a move on her, because that’d be really douchey. She squeezed back, slumped down in her seat, and I could hear her breathing grow even with about thirty miles left to Seattle. I didn’t know where her house was, so when the signs started giving the exits for the city, I woke her up.

 

“We’re here, tell me where to go.”

 

“Oh. Exit Jackson.”

 

“Sir yessir, Cap’n Max.”

 

She gave me directions off the highway and over to her house, and the moment we pulled up her parents ran out. They’d been watching, I guess. Waiting. Hoping. They scrambled toward us, and Max climbed out of the truck while I waited, wondering what kind of welcome I’d get.

 

“Max!” her mom was practically on the verge of tears, still in her pajamas. “You didn’t call; you didn’t answer our texts!”

 

“Sorry, phone died,” she said. “It’s a long drive, Chloe and I just…got out. We just left.”

 

“We’re so glad you’re safe,” Ryan said, giving her a hug, and giving me one too, without warning, just taking me in his arms and squeezing. “You too, Chloe, I’m so glad Max has a friend to get through all this mess.”

 

“Yeah, me too,” I mumbled, wondering when someone would comment on the blue hair.

 

“Thank you for bringing her back. Let’s get you girls inside.”

 

We walked across the lawn, and Max’s parents started yammering about the news they’d had out of Arcadia Bay, and how worried they’d been about Max. I could tell that they were purposefully not asking about Joyce, because every time they started talking about people they knew from back home, they’d give me a side-eye. I knew that look. It’s the look you get on Father’s Day when your dad died that May, when everyone _knows._ Except they couldn’t know anything about Joyce.  

 

“Need something to eat?”

 

“Nah,” I said, “I really just need some sleep.”

 

“I bet,” said Vanessa, “after driving, what is it, five hours, up from Arcadia Bay, by yourself. On a day like this. Max really ought to get that license of hers.”

 

“Sure,” said Max, who wasn’t really paying attention. “Chloe, I’ll get you some PJs. My room is this way.”

 

“Thanks for letting me stay,” I said, even though I was just assuming that I was allowed to stay. I’d spent the night at their house in Arcadia Bay often enough. It wasn’t like I was some delinquent punk their daughter had just picked off the street—although I might as well be, for as well as Ryan and Vanessa knew me now. And I was a delinquent punk. Whatever.

 

“Anytime, Chloe.”

 

I followed Max into her room, where she was holding a pair of flannel pants and a t-shirt. “This is what I’ve got for you, obviously it’ll be a little short, but it’ll work.” She stopped, put them on the bed, and wrapped her arms around me, her head coming up just to my eyes. “I’m sorry I was so mean, I’m sorry, you’re all that matters to me. I love you so much.”

 

“I love you too, Max,” I said, pulling her close.

 

“Let’s get some sleep.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chloe has had a crush on Max for way longer than is healthy.

I woke up drooling on the pillow. Typical. Max’s face was smooshed nose-down, and she was still asleep, snoring. Loudly. It was hard to keep from touching her, with her face six inches from mine, with us sharing a bed. She stirred, stretched, yawned, and lifted her face off the pillow, not necessarily in that order. She blinked a few times, and looked at me.

 

“How long have you been awake?”

 

“About thirty seconds,” I said.

 

“Good, I’d be a terrible host if I’d left you any longer. My drea—oh my god, Chloe. It wasn’t a dream. Oh my god. Oh _my god._ ”

 

“Shhhhh, shhh.” I shushed her, grabbing her hand and linking my fingers with hers. “It’s okay.  I promise it’s okay. You’re okay. I’m okay. We’ll be alright.”

 

She whimpered. “All those people.”

 

And even after a good night’s sleep, it still felt like shit, to listen to her go on about everyone we’d left behind, because it made me feel like I should be traded. No matter that my fucking _mother_ was included in that, that pretty much everyone I’d known my entire life was buried in the debris of what used to be Arcadia Bay, she’d said that I was her _number one priority_ and now that she’d actually made the decision? What? She didn’t like it anymore? She’d changed her mind?

 

“All those people, Chloe,” she repeated.

 

 _Shut up, Chloe. It’s not_ about _you. You’re just the smallest, tiniest, most miniscule piece that’s part of this fucked-up confectionery that is Max’s powers_. What could I do but think all these stupid thoughts, thought? It wasn’t as if that was a part of my brain that I could just turn off, just stop thinking these crappy, self-loathing, selfish thoughts of mine; my brain couldn’t work like that.

 

“I know. I know.” Her eyes widened, she bit her lip, screwing up her face as if she was about to cry. Hell, I might have been about to cry. “It’s okay, Maxi-Pad. It really is okay. We’ll be okay.”

 

“That’s not the point, Chloe.”

 

“Yeah, but I figure it’ll make you feel better.”

 

She closed her eyes. “It doesn’t.”

 

“Okay.”

 

I swung my legs off the side of the bed and dressed in my clothes from the day before. It was all I had left; most likely the rest of my wardrobe had gotten destroyed in the tornado/hurricane, whatever you wanted to call it, so I’d probably need to go shopping. Ugh. (At least the thrift shops in Seattle were probably pretty good?)

 

Max just stayed where she was. Well, she deserved a rest.

 

I stomped over to the kitchen, where Vanessa and Ryan were already getting started on breakfast. Waffles. They’d really gone all out.

 

“Oh, Chloe,” said Ryan. He was twisting the dial on the waffle iron. “Waffles?”

 

“Smells delicious, Ry—Mr. Caulfield. Yes, please.” I pulled out a chair and sat my butt down, wondering what Ryan and Vanessa were thinking about the whole incident; their daughter showing up with her punk-ass ex-best friend who probably still reeked of weed (did showers I’d taken in Max’s alternate universes count? Because otherwise I couldn’t remember the last time I’d taken one), just barely having escaped the storm that had just claimed the entire town where they’d all lived together for thirteen years.

 

“So, Chloe,” said Vanessa. “You look different.”

 

Might as well be blunt, I guess.

 

“Yeah, a lot’s changed around Arcadia Bay since you all left. We even have indoor plumbing there now.”

 

“Your sarcasm’s stayed the same,” said Ryan. That was a lie. I hadn’t picked up my characteristic acerbic wit until _after_ my dad had died. After the Caulfields had skipped town. “What do you take on your waffles?”

 

“Maple syrup, if you’ve got it.”

 

“Sure thing.” He reached into the cabinet and pulled out a bottle of the real stuff, not Mrs. Butterworth’s or whatever crap most people have.

 

What would Max think, once she came to the kitchen, seeing me eating waffles with Ryan and Vanessa as if our lives hadn’t been completely, totally altered forever? As if I wasn’t basically a walking dead girl, having died _over and over and over_ where only Max could see it, as if the universe itself hadn’t been conspiring to put me in the ground for the past week, and hadn’t actually succeeded several times.

 

This was so fucking normal I couldn’t stand it. So I did what I had to do, and I ate my goddamn waffles.

 

“Good morning,” said Max dejectedly, and that’s when things got awkward, because now that we were both up they had to make a point of not addressing the world’s biggest elephant in the room. Yeah, everyone we all knew was dead. My parents were probably dead. Max’s friends were dead. Her school had been ploughed to the ground, so they needed to decide where (if) she’d finish. As the room’s token dropout, I wasn’t so worried about that as actually finding a place to live outside of the town where I’d grown up.

 

“Good morning,” said Vanessa, way too cheerfully. “Waffles?”

 

“No thanks,” said Max. “I’m not really hungry. I’m going to go get dressed.”

 

“Why don’t’ you girls just spend the day at home?”

 

“I’d rather go downtown or something…keep my mind off things.”

 

“Okay, sweetheart.” She disappeared back down the hall and showed back up wearing that Jane Doe t-shirt of hers, the one that she’d been wearing that day I rescued her in the Blackwell parking lot. If you can call it “rescuing”. Jeans, as usual, but they hung a little differently on her body. She’d hadn’t got enough food the past few days, I thought that she probably should have spent more time rewinding to feed herself twice and keep more sleep.

 

“Ready, Chloe?”

 

“Coffee?”

 

“I’ll buy you Starbucks.”

 

I grumbled something about the burnt quality of their coffee, but grabbed my keys off the counter and wished goodbye to her parents. “I’ll bring her back safe.”

 

“I’d tell you to be back before midnight, but you’re both grownups.”

 

“Right you are, Mr. Caulfield.”

 

-

 

“Can I hold your hand?”

 

“Sure.” I paused. “People might get the wrong idea, though.”

 

“What’s wrong about that idea?”

 

“Nothing, I just thought—maybe—I don’t know. I wasn’t sure. There was always Warren and…stuff. I was never sure.”

 

“I kissed you back in your bedroom, didn’t I?”

 

“That was a dare.”

 

She interlaced our fingers. Her palm was warm, small, and fit perfectly inside mine. “I don’t care. To me it felt real.”

 

“I need to turn the car on,” I said awkwardly.

 

“I know you’re still hung up on Rachel—“

 

“Rachel is dead.”

 

“I know,” said Max. “I know that she’s dead, but in a way that makes it worse because it’s like this perfect person beyond the grave that I can’t compete with. She’ll always be this person in the back of your mind, and you’ll wonder _what if_ and maybe you’d be—like, with me, if that’s something you want…but you still think about her, she’s still back there.”

 

“ _What if_ is such a weird concept with you, Max. There’s no _what if,_ there’s only, _Max decided this was best and I trusted her._ ”

 

“I couldn’t bring her back even if I’d wanted to, Chloe.”

 

“Did you want to?”

 

“Maybe.”

 

“I’m not hung up on Rachel.” She looked at me skeptically as I turned the keys in the ignition and put my hand back on hers. “Okay, I’m hung up on Rachel. But you’re here, in front of me, real, and if I’ve got it right, you’re basically confessing your love for me—and I love you back, _in that way,_ and I want nothing more than to give you a big sloppy kiss to make up for that lame peck back in my bedroom—and you love me back, which Rachel never did, and even if she’s still _back there,_ she can’t compare to you.” I took a breath. “You’re…amazing.”

 

“Sto—“

 

“Incredible.”

 

“Chloe—“

 

“Magnificent.”

 

“…”

 

“Beautiful. Can I kiss you now?”

 

“Yeah, you can kiss me now.”

 

She leaned towards me, and we met in the middle, our mouths crashing into each other with a little too much force. Her lips opened and our tongues tangled in that weird, wet, sloppy kissing kind of way—“it shouldn’t look neat”, Rachel told me once, when I wondered about it, long before I’d first kissed a girl— _but I shouldn’t be thinking about Rachel_ , _here is Maxine Caulfield, basically the love of your (very short, so far) life, macking on you_ , _dumbass_. I felt our mouths molding to each other, the kissing growing more urgent so that I started feeling that kind of heat in my groin.

 

We broke apart. I was basically swelling with pride over not only having basically seduced the girl I’d had an unresolved crush on for five years, but amazement about how well things can fall together even when the world seems to be falling apart.

 

Actually, fuck _seems._ When the world _is_ falling apart. When the world _has_ fallen apart, when everything you’ve known is destroyed, and it seems a little fucked up to think that you’re in love with someone, but you really can’t help it, and you’d be in love with her anyway. And now’s as good a time as any, because why sit there waiting?

 

“So, where to, Captain?”

 

“Anywhere. I just want to do that again.”

 

“Uh, Max, that’s not how it works. I don’t know Seattle. Like, at all.”

 

“Doh.” She smacked herself on the forehead, and for a moment she was herself, like she’d forgotten all about this, and I was going to let her. “We could go the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art. Or something. I don’t know, we could wander around downtown. Something.”

 

“Just tell me how to get there, Mega Max.”

 

“That’s a new one,” she said.

 

“What can I say? I’m a wellspring of creativity when it comes to nicknames for you.”

 

“That you are. And your puns are terrible.”

 

“Don’t diss my puns.”

 

“I _will_ diss your puns, until the end of time, Chloe Price.”

 

“You’re killing me, Caulfield.”

 

“Not as bad as your puns kill anyone of good taste, ever.”

 

I giggled. She chuckled, and we looked at each other. “I’m so glad I have you around,” I said, really, really meaning it.

 

“So am I. I mean, to have you around. Because—“ I would swear, you could watch her eyes go dark.

 

I put my hand back on hers, for what felt like the hundredth time. “Hey Max, I’m not losing you, am I? Let’s make this a good day. The photo’s gone. There’s nothing we can do. Spilled milk and all that.”

 

“You’re right. Let’s make this a good day.”

 

“That smile is totally fake.”

 

“So what? I’m trying. For you.”

 

“Okay.”

 

“We can pretend that this is just a normal day in Seattle, if I’d invited you here because I’d decided to stop being an ass after five years. Just a normal day, two friends—or whatever we are—hitting the town for a day. It’ll be fun.”

 

“For sure.”

 

I released the emergency brake and started down the street. Max gave me directions to get back on the freeway.

 

“Okay, here, switch. Left lane. Exit here.”

 

The whole time, almost, our hands stayed on the console, linked together. It was a kind of relief to feel her hand in mine after so long. When you’re kids you hold hands all the time, but as you get older it turns into something that you don’t do, not unless you’re a romantic couple. Well, maybe Max and I are that now, so take that, world.  

 

“I love you,” I said, just to say it out loud.

 

“Platonically, or…?”

 

“Both. In every way. I love you in any way that a human being could ever possibly love another human being.”

 

She looked at our hands, interlocked, and told me to take a right. “I love you too, Chloe. So much. I can’t even tell you— “

 

“I know.”

 

“I can’t tell you all the things I’ve done for you—all the things I _would_ do for you, if someone asked me to. All the things I will do for you, if I get the chance, just ordinary things, that have nothing to do with messing with time. I’ll do all the ordinary things in the world for you, and if I have to use my powers again to save you again, I’ll do that too.”

 

“I don’t know how to make it up to you, ever. Especially for what you did for me, you know, in that other timeline, when I made you—“

 

“You don’t have to say it.”

 

“Thank you. I’m sorry, anyway.”

 

“You don’t have to be. You were in pain.”

 

“Let’s not talk about this.”

 

“Yeah. A good day, right?” She gave my hand a squeeze and looked at me, smiling a little half-heartedly. “Okay, park in this garage.”

 

“You know I don’t have seventeen dollars, right?”

 

“I’ll pay it, it’s fine.”

 

I pulled into the first spot we saw, which was a snug fit for my truck.

 

“What first?”

 

“I was thinking ice cream.”

 

“On a Saturday morning? You rebel.”

 

“Says the girl who’s probably hiding like, fifteen different joints in this truck alone.”

 

“Try two.”

 

“Where are they?”

 

“Like I’m telling you, Miss Goody-Goody.”

 

“Fair enough. It’s not even illegal here anymore, you know.”

 

“Believe me, I know.”

 

Max opened the door and led the way out of the garage. “This way,” she said, turning right. “I think there’s a Baskin Robbins or something this way, and we deserve it after everything that’s happened this week.”

 

“Aye aye, Cap’n Max.”

 

-

 

Inside the ice cream parlor, everything seemed disturbingly normal. Just kids doling out scoops of ice cream, looking tired, probably surprised to see anyone here at ten in the morning.

 

“One large cone of rainbow sherbert, one of mint chocolate chip,” she told the cashier, who rang us up.

 

“You remembered,” I said, surprised.

 

“Chloe, we were best friends for like, ten years. Just because I hadn’t seen you in five doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten _everything._ My treat.” She paid.

 

“Okay, but if you’d asked _me_ what _your_ favorite ice cream flavor was like, two minutes ago, I can’t guarantee I would have known the answer.”

 

“That’s because you’re an ass.”

 

“Them’s fightin’ words, Maximillian. Also, rainbow sherbet isn’t even ice cream. It’s sherbet. That’s _pathetic_.”

 

“Rainbow sherbet counts. I’ll fight you.”

 

“You ready to throw down right here, Mad Max?”

 

“You bet.” She balled her hands into fists and raised them like she was about to box me. “I’ll fight for rainbow sherbet’s right to be recognized as a real ice cream flavor any day, and no punk-rock ice-cream elitist is going to change my mind.”

 

“Here’s your ice cream, Million-Dollar Baby,” said the guy behind the counter, looking kind of annoyed.

 

“Thanks,” said Max, taking her double scoop of rainbow sherbet, and handing me my double mint chocolate chip. “We can go outside. It’s a nice day. For Seattle, at least.”

 

“I was gonna say…”

 

We stepped outside and she froze in her tracks. She looked at me, with the horror from last night back on her face. “I keep forgetting. I keep forgetting, and then I feel bad about forgetting, because the least those people deserve is for the person who _killed_ them to forget about them. I’m so awful. Here we are, laughing over ice cream, when people are fucking dead.”

 

I pulled her down the street, trying to get her to keep walking. “You didn’t _kill_ them, Max.”

 

“I might as well have. I did, in the ways that matter. It was all my fault, and I didn’t stop it.”

 

I kept her left hand in my right, and walked down the street. It wasn’t busy, for a Saturday morning, and a few cars whizzed by. No one was listening to us. “I’m not going to argue with you any more, Max. You know how I feel about it. But you and I, we’re good. And eventually, it might not hurt as much. And I’ll stick with you for as long as you want me to, forever if you’ll let me, and until you can bear the pain, otherwise.”

 

“Please stay.”

 

“I will,” I said, taking a big lick of my ice cream. “And just because some people are dead doesn’t mean we shouldn’t enjoy our ice cream. That’s what they’d want. Probably. Well, maybe not Sado-erson. But the rest of them.”

 

“Ugh, that’s another thing I keep forgetting. What a bastard.” Her ice cream was melting, but I figured now was too serious a moment to mention it.

 

“Yeah, Max, that guy was seriously evil. At least he’s dead. Probably.”

 

“I hope so. He’s the only one that deserved it. Not even Nathan, really.”

 

“I guess,” I said, not quite believing it. “Also, your ice cream is melting.”

 

“Crap!” she did that thing where she lifted the cone up and gave it a big lick lengthwise. It was strangely erotic.

 

“I know what you’re thinking!” she said, as she caught me looking. “Don’t you _dare_ keep that image in your brain, Chloe Price, you pervert! Don’t think it! Or I swear to god, I’ll—“ Here we were, this close to a rewind joke.

 

I deflected. “What can I say?”

 

“Get your head out of the gutter!”

 

“Sir yessir.” I took a bite of my ice cream. “Fuck, brain freeze.”

 

“Serves you right,” she said, giggling. “I’d give you a smack if my hand wasn’t otherwise occupied.” She gave my hand another squeeze and finished her cone, tossing the wrapper in a trash can.

 

“Where to next?” I asked. “We’ve got parking for the whole day, thanks to the crazy amount they charge back there, which I can’t _believe_ you’re paying for.”

 

“We’re taking a mental health day,” she said. “We can splurge. Where do _you_ want to go?”

 

“Say the word, Max. I’ll follow you wherever.”


End file.
